What this misses is that you might be the problem.<p>I've worked at a startup where the exec team has turned over 100% multiple times. This advice would not surface that issue, it would perpetuate it.<p>If you are a leader, and you are having a problem with a report, you need to ask yourself first: is it them, or is it me? Emotionally hard to do.
Hmmm.. the advice given here seems to open the door to a lot of biases. Why might you not "enthusiastically" rehire someone? It might not be for their fit to the role, their job performance, or any other important factor. It may just be...your enthusiasm. Which very often wanes with your personal prejudices.
It's the highest signal question to ask in reference checks as well. It gives the reference an out to be honest and not feel like they're being disloyal. It's a very direct question that is hard to fudge without lying.<p>"I would rehire them in a heartbeat" = yes,
"I have been trying to recruit them for months, you lucky bastard" = yes,
"If the right role came up, I would certainly consider them" = no,
"Uh.. yeah, I think" = no
This sounds great if you trust yourself to rehire someone better, reliably enough to cover for the friction of re-hiring and the collateral effect of firing on the morale of the rest of the team.<p>If you're likely to see a new candidate's strengths, but the incumbent's weaknesses, then they're cooked. If the other employees have a different perception of the situation than you do, then the morale hit is assured. I have a rule of thumb, that upon firing a well-liked, or even not-disliked employee, it takes about a year for morale within their team to recover.
> if the position was open today and this person was available – with full knowledge of their strengths and weaknesses – would you enthusiastically offer them the job?<p>> I think enthusiastically is an important word in the question because it drives clarity. You can’t say maybe to that question. If there is any doubt, you have your answer.<p>> I would suspect that very few people would want to be at a place where their boss would not be excited about rehiring them. I sure wouldn’t.<p>Huh? This excludes 100% of all jobs to several significant digits. Most jobs aren't important enough that you need someone in them whose very presence brings joy to your otherwise dreary life. And almost no one is aspiring to fill their role that way.
The question could also be: "will you enthusiastically want to rehire them 6 months after they are let go?". It seems fairly common for C-level execs to have a limited understanding of what people actually do.
Incredible how this obvious advice, of firing people who are not doing a good job, needs to be couched as deep insight and a mental trick (reframing it as rehiring) in order to get past the absurd levels of agreeableness among the wealthy, cosmopolitan people running companies these days.